One Chance
by Iledid
Summary: Christian needs the money to start his company, but his parents don't budge. He turns to a financial advisor for options; her suggestion - become a YouTuber with a fake love interest, Anastasia.
1. Prologue

"So you're telling me there's no other way?" He was frustrated, even more annoyed with his parents now. He rubbed his forehead and looked down at the floor in disappointment.

"I'm sorry to tell you this." The financial advisor closed her eyes and hoped for a better reaction to her next suggestion. "There might be a way, however you have to be opened minded. It just might work."

"At this point, I'm open to anything. My parents are adamant about not allowing me access to the trust fund, and I can't stand sitting in these boring as fuck classes at Harvard anymore." He lets out a deep sigh.

"With the amount of money you need, you need something that has to do something with fame -"

He immediately cuts her off, "If it involves porn I'm not doing it. I'm not exactly keen on showing my dick to the whole world when I'm trying to be serious about my business." He goes to stand up and leave but she waves him off.

"Stop. Being. So. Arrogant. Now listen, have you heard of Youtubers?" She stands up and starts to pace around the office.

"The app right? With funny videos of animals and all of that?" He stares at her in confusion.

"Yes, but not exactly. How are you at acting?" She leans on her desk and looks down at him.

"I can lie." He suggests with a frown appearing on his face. He hadn't exactly done any acting but he still wanted to hear what she had to say.

"Well, this YouTube community has, as of late, been making a lot of money. I've been in contact with other financial advisors who work with well known youtubers. Top notch youtubers make on average a million a year - beauty gurus, vloggers, pranksters, people who stay overnight at places they shouldn't be." His eyes widened in surprise. "They make money off of the ads that YouTube puts beside their videos and such."

"And how would that work for me? I don't know about how to do any of that."

"Become a vlogger. Record yourself doing the things you do at Harvard. Such as how you got into the school, your daily routine as a student at the best college in the nation, show off your girlfriend, how you work-"

He cuts her off in slight confusion, a deep v now cut into the middle of his eyebrows, "I don't have a girlfriend, and this seems like a lot of work. If I stay in school, I need to keep up my grades or my parents are going get on my ass again."

She smirks at him. "I know you don't have a girlfriend. But, romance sparks interest. How would you feel about working on this project with another fellow Harvard student?" She ignores his second comment, this whole project is to make money so that he can do whatever he wants to do.

"So, we would split the money?" She nods with a large smile on her face.

"Exactly, you would be getting more money in the long run anyways because more people will be interested in the both of you rather than either of you on your own."

"I'm interested. Why does she need the money?"

"That's something you need to talk to her about. I will set up a meeting time for you guys in the upcoming week. Just send me your schedule for the next week, and I'll let you know." She's now giddy on the inside, not only was she helping _two_ people make money, she would make a large profit from helping them. And the best part was that she wasn't doing the work.

"Alright. I like the idea; I'll just have to talk to her more to see how it works out. What's her name? What is she like?"

"Christian, you don't have to worry. Anastasia is a beauty and she's very sweet. She's soft spoken and she'll have your back. She's close friends with my daughter, Kate, since high school. Just you wait, this will be a great turnout. I'm going to get everything set, and hopefully you both will start next week."

 _A/N Just a pitch. Later chapters will be longer but this is just the prologue. Please review or let me know what I could do better. More reviews = More updates._


	2. Introductions

Christian's POV

"Are you ready, Christian?"

I nod. I'm excited to start taking action. I couldn't just sit around and wait until I graduate. My time is now. I have been planning all the steps necessary to start my company.

I'm now sitting in the god awful, uncomfortable chair at a coffee shop in a suit from my high school graduation. I've put all of my time and effort, including every penny, to reach my goal so it's all in a saving account. I've talked to potential investors after my parents' disapproval, but I decided that I didn't want to report back to a board or committee after every decision I make. I want to do it on my own and I know that it'll be so much more worth it. I know I can do it without graduating from Harvard - the only person who has faith in me after looking over my plans is Ros, a senior, business student also at Harvard. I've been thinking about making her my COO, but I don't want to make any promises I can't keep.

After listening to Elle Kavanaugh's suggestion, I became increasingly anxious as the day grew closer to finally meeting Anastasia. I took Elle's advice on planning videos, and already had video ideas for the next month with an upload once a week. I was thinking it would be our channel about life at college, classes, and such. Then, when we start making a profit it could be more of a daily routine instead of weekly. At that point, I probably wouldn't have to worry about school anymore and start dedicating my time towards GEH.

Doubt lingers in the back of my mind that this will be a waste of time - this is the only chance I have, a large investment. The biggest issues I see here are that someone has to edit the videos and I don't know Anastasia. If she's not dedicated to this project, she could just leave me hanging. Granted, I most likely could still do it on my own, however Elle said it would be more difficult. With Anastasia's partnership, we could take turns in taking the responsibility of creating video ideas, filming, editing, etc.

In addition, I have done the research on "Youtubers" and a lot of them gain profit from interacting with viewers, promotions, livestreams so there are potential ideas we could do in the future. Viewers are the key to our success so we have to keep them satisfied. Elle mentioned over the past week that the first few months will be rough but we just had to be patient.

"- you and Anastasia will have to pretend to be a couple outside of the making the videos. If anyone- Christian. Are you paying attention?" I snap out of my thoughts and look over to her.

"Sorry, I was thinking."

She snaps her fingers in front of me with an annoyed look on her face. "Snap out of it. You need to focus to make this work. You two must act like a real couple in public. If the channel becomes a big hit, there are potential fans in the area that will expose the facade and everything will be ruined. Also, keep in mind to be aware of what you put on the internet. You don't know what psychos are out there ready to pounce." Elle continued.

I felt uneasy at her last comment. The loud bell for the coffee shop door entrance rung, and I turned my head to the most stunning girl I've ever met. She gave a small smile and started walk towards our table. I noticed she held an elegant atmosphere around her. She stood strong and tall, luscious brown waves, and beautiful blue eyes - nevertheless they looked lost despite all the beauty.

"Ana!" Elle stood up from her chair and gave Anastasia a hug and pecks on the cheek. "This is Christian Grey, the boy I've been telling you about." I raise an eyebrow at her, _what has she been saying about me?_

I turn to the brunette goddess and hold out my hand to her, "Hi Anastasia, it's nice to finally meet you." _She's gorgeous._ I give a smirk and a signature wink. It affects the girls I've been with before, but Anastasia doesn't even give a second thought before shaking my hand. _I guess_ _business_ _as usual?_

"Please, call me Ana," She says shyly.

"That would be a disservice. Anastasia is a beautiful name and its suits you perfectly." I compliment. I can't help myself. She gives a small smile and that's it.

Elle interupts to tell us that she's leaving us alone while we get to know each other and that an official meeting to discuss terms and such will be two days before beginning the channel.

"Okay. Thank you Elle." We wave her off and get comfortable across from each other.

"So Anastasia, Elle told me you're also attending Harvard right?" I ask. She seems soft spoken.

"Yes." She speaks quietly, but clears her throat and continues. "I'm a sophomore now and I'm currently majoring in English literature." She gives a shy smile, showing off her dimples. _So fucking adorable._ "What about you? What are you majoring in?"

"I'm a junior and I'm currently double majoring in Business and Economics. However, once I have enough money, I plan on dropping out." She nods understandably. I look at her closely, and I don't see an smudge of judgement. It's refreshing to see someone who can accept my goal. "Has Elle told you about why I'm doing this?"

"No, she insisted that we get to know each other on our own so that we can form a friendship. She said quote 'it'll look better on camera'" She lets out a small giggle and tucks a lock of her hair behind her ear. But as quickly as her happiness came, it soon left and she looked stoic again.

"Ahh okay. So clean slate. Well I've been wanting to start my holdings company for awhile now, but I just don't have enough funds for it. That's why I've turned to Elle. And you?" _Can I ask her out on a date? Stop it Christian. Be professional. Don't blur the lines._

"Um. It's personal. It's sort of time sensitive. When the time comes, I'll let you know. As for now, I'd like to keep it to myself. Sorry." _OK. Christian you need to back off._

"Don't worry about it. We all have things we want to keep for ourselves. I understand."

We continue to talk for the next hour about anything and everything. The conversation is easy and light, and we talk about social life at Harvard and class. I soon realize that Anastasia Rose Steele has caught my interest like no one has ever before. The more I get to know her, the more I _want_ to know her. Everything she does interests me. The way she smiles. The way her eyes shines. The way she keeps her guard up. She's intelligent and genuine and everything I expect my dream girl to be. _I don't want to push her._ She may not be open to having a real relationship. Although, I want more with her, I just want to spend time with her and protect her from whatever she's suffering from. _I'm determined to gain her friendship._

A/N More to come soon! Would you guys rather have short but faster updates or longer updates that take a longer time? I'm just writing as I go along so please let me know if you want something to happen in particular so I can incorporate it. I have an idea of where the story is heading but I'm open to suggestions.

And shout out to kz4valentina for the encouragement and motivation!


	3. How We Got In To Harvard

Few days have passed since I have met with Anastasia and I have never been more confident in the plan. It's nice to put a face to a name and getting to know Anastasia put my doubts on the back burner.

Elle, Anastasia, and I met up to go over terms, specifically responsibilities and financial agreements. Once the money started to roll in Elle would take 20%, while Ana and I each received 40%. It didn't sound like a lot but at this moment, any income would help. We just had to be patient. Anastasia suggested to take turns editing and uploading the videos.

I have done everything I can to make Grey Enterprise Holdings possible - it was all up to fate now. Today was the first day of starting our YouTube channel.

I have gotten to know Anastasia the past week and needless to say, I'm intrigued by her. She has only told me about her life at school. Everything personal about family and her past was off limits. I didn't want invade her privacy so I decided to keep my distance, although I really wanted to figure her out.

To be honest, sharing our lives on the internet is chilling. To lay out our lives for people to judge and criticize us.

Anastasia and I thought it was too much and decided to not pay much attention to the comments. Elle agreed to screen through the comments and show us only ones that were supportive.

Along with social media comes with the fact that it will be on the internet for everyone to see. So we also decided to essentially fake our relationship on screen and out in public.

Flash back to the night before *

"I've put a lot of thought into this and we need to be more mindful about our 'relationship.'" Anastasia emphasizes with quotation marks in the air with her delicate fingers.

We were in my apartment now, discussing the parameters of our relationship for the second day now. She sat criss-crossed on the couch, beside me as I leaned back into the cusion with my arm hanging off the back. Her knee grazed my thigh, making my cock twitch.

Christian, calm down.

She made it very clear that she wasn't interested.But with every lip bite and alluring stare, he couldn't resist the temptation. She's Aphrodite, a siren, a goddess - and he couldn't reach her.

"What do you mean?"

"Well, maybe we should consider being in a fake relationship when we're in public at school." I cocked an eyebrow at her and tilted my head. She's making it harder for me. "Harvard is not a very large school. Imagine the drama if someone gets word that we actually don't really know each other."

"Okay." I'm worried for her. I don't want to make her uncomfortable. "Are you sure you're comfortable with this?"

"Yes. We'll learn to take it slowly and what we are and are not comfortable with." She looks down and bites her lip again.

That fucking lip bite. It drives me crazy.

"Let's try to figure out our limits. Are you okay with holding hands?" She nods her head and surprises me by taking my hand into hers.

"Practice." She says in her oh so sweet voice and shows off her killer smile.

Kill me now.

I clear my throat again and straighten myself up whilst still holding her hand in mine. "What about other forms of affection?"

"I'm okay with hugging and kissing. We'll just work on it." She lets go of my hand and pulls away. "Another thing I forgot to mention is that I will not be available Sundays and Monday's."

That's odd. Sundays and Mondays were the only days where she doesn't have classes.

"Alright, sounds like a plan." She glances to the clock behind me on the wall.

"It's getting late. I should get going."

I nod. "I'll drive you back to your dorm."

"Oh no. I don't want to bother you. I'll be fine and my dorm is only a 10 minute walk."

"And that's 10 minutes too long on your own in the dark. You're a gorgeous woman and anyone could take advantage of you."

"I'll have you know Christian that I'm an independent woman and I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself." She crosses her arms across her chest and is giving me a stern look.

"I completely understand but if something were to happen to you and I didn't give 15 minutes of my time to drive you, I wouldn't be able to forgive myself." Her eyes soften but I can tell she's a bit upset about my comment. I stand firm so I grab my jacket from the closet and move to open the front door, letting her leave first. She rolls her eyes at me and walks out the door.

End of Flashback*

It's 9 AM now and I'm on my way to pick up Anastasia for breakfast. We're going to go over some details for our first video and then film right afterwards.

I pull up in front of her dorm building and the sky is getting cloudy and gloomy. I walk up to her dorm room and knock. The door opens and a blonde girl opens it.

"Hi, Christian right?"

"That's me"

She opens the door wider to let me in. "Ana! Your man is here!" She turns back to me, "Come on in."

I step into the common room and am surprised to see how large the dorm suite is. I decided to leave the dorms after my freshmen year since it seemed like my roommates didn't really appreciate my nightmares. I can't really blame them, I would be too.

I hear a lot of commotion from the kitchen and see 7 other people just standing around.

Full house or should I say full dorm.

"Ooohhh Ana's boyfriend is here!" A tall girl, with jet black hair says.

She practically skips over to me. "Hi, I'm Evelyn. We're all of Ana's roommates."

The blonde who opened the door for me is in the kitchen cooking now and yells, "I'm Kate by the way and if you hurt Ana I will hurt you!"

"Duly noted." Jesus Christ, that must be Katherine Kavanaugh.

"I'm Christian." The rest of them proceeded to introduce themselves: Jose, Jack, Steve, Leila, and Paul. They all seemed pretty friendly except for the fact that Jack and Paul kept on glaring at me.

Co-ed suite? I need to talk to Ana about this. It's sort of unsettling.

Moments later, I hear a door from the hallway open and Anastasia walks in, looking gorgeous as always.

"Hi Beautiful." I walk towards her and pull her in for a hug and kiss her forehead. We haven't really went over how we were gonna act around friends, but it's better to be safe than sorry.

"Aww!" I hear the girls squeal in the background.

She blushes and smiles up at me. "Hi, hopefully my roommates haven't scared you off."

"Well I'm just going to head out." I hear Jack say before slamming the door on his way out. Paul mutters something before leaving also.

"Ready to go?" I ask. She nods and we're on our way to a nearby cafe.

At the cafe *

"I was thinking our first video would be on how we got into Harvard. What our grades were, classes we took, SAT scores. Are you comfortable with that?" She nods.

"What's our love story? Like where did we meet? Or our first date? My roommates were asking me the other day and I didn't know how to respond."

I thought to myself and I remembered that she told me she also came from the same part of Seattle.

"We can say that we met in an English class and I was flunking so the professor referred me to you to help me. Then we became friends and discovered that we came from the same city while going the same flight home for the summer, and the rest is history." I also added with a wink and let out a laugh, "It's impossible to resist my charm." I say jokingly.

"Please your head is already big as it is, it doesn't need to be bigger." She giggles, referring to my ego and I'm enchanted.

"Ms. Steele, I am wounded," placing a hand over my chest, pretending to be hurt by her words. She lets out a laugh.

Man if only I could make her laugh for the rest of our lives. . . WAIT slow your roll Christian. You've known her for less than two weeks.

"Anyways the story works out because Kate was in New York all summer. She's been pressing me ever since I told her last week that I had a boyfriend whom I met over the summer."

"So you're not going to tell Kate about our YouTube ordeal?"

"No, Elle is practically my mother. She's been helping me for a long time without Kate noticing. Anyways, the less people that know about our relationship, there is less room for mistakes you know?"

"I agree. So, how long have you known your roommates. They seem um- How would you say it? - er enthusiastic?" We both chuckle at my wording. Gasp. She has dimples.

"I've known all of them except for Kate for less than a month. They're all of Kate's friends. She met them while interning at the Google headquarters the past summer."

"I see. Does it make you uncomfortable? There's so many people around all the time." And they are BOYS.

"I got used to it pretty quickly. We all pair with one other roommate to share a bedroom so I don't see everyone all the time unless I decide to go to the common room and kitchen."

Definitely not for me.

"What about you? Why did you choose to live in an apartments?"

"Sharing space with other people was just not my preference. " Especially when I'm screaming out bloody murder in my sleep.

We soon finish our food, going over the aspects of our relationship and video, and then we start filming. I invested in a somewhat good quality camera. I just asked the worker which was the best price for it's value. I just now have to figure it out. The thing I liked about it is that it had a flipped monitor so we could see ourselves while filming.

Let's get the show on the road.

How We Got In To Harvard

"Hi Guys! I'm Christian."

"And I'm Ana." We both wave to the camera somewhat awkwardly. There was an awkward silence, and then the next thing I knew we were both on the floor laughing. After a few moments we composed ourselves and looked over to each other.

"After we introduce ourselves, we'll say why we wanted to start our channel. And then go from there." She speaks with a small smile on her face, dimples showing and eyes shining.

This may be fucked up but I'm glad I get to call her mine. . . Even if it's a facade.

"Ok and we don't have to focus on keeping our thoughts straight. I'll edit the video to try to make it seem more natural."

She nods, "We can do this. We got into Harvard for God's sakes!" She grabs my hand leads us in front of the camera again. We've set up the camera on a tripod in my living room coffee table in front of our balcony so we had some light and it apparently looked more "cozy" according to Ana. I sit beside her, wrapping my arm around her waist and my other hand holding my coffee.

"I don't understand how you drink black coffee. It's disgusting!" She wrinkles her nose and I laugh, partly at how adorable she looks. When I'm with her, I feel free. I don't have to worry about my fucked up past and the financial drama with my parents.

"It's better than filling it with an absurd amount of sugar. It's not even coffee at that point." She rolls her eyes and looks back towards the coffee table. We, or I guess she, made a list of topics we were going to discuss.

"Hi guys! I'm Ana." She then looks up to me.

I finally realize that it's my turn to speak, "oh shit! I mean crap my bad. I'm Christian." I'll have to figure out how to beep out audio now.

"We decided to make this channel so we are able to document our life together and share with the world what it's like to be a student at Harvard University. I'm sure there have been some stereotypes going around social media." Ana continues to introduce the channel while I add in comments here and there.

"For the rest of the video, we're just going to talk about our academics and extracurriculars in which we believe helped us get into Harvard." Christian turns to Ana. "Let's start with GPA and classes?"

"The high school I went to had a pretty simple system. If you got straight As, you had a 4.0 GPA. However, if a student was taking AP classes versus students that were not, those with more AP classes had a higher ranking." Interesting. She stops talking and looks at me, expecting me to talk next.

"What was your ranking?" I ask, genuinely interested now.

A blush creeps up on her face, "I don't really want to brag or anything like that." She whispers.

She's humble too! Where has she been all my life.

"Anastasia, you're just telling them facts. You should be proud of your accomplishments." I encourage her.

"I was number 2 in a class of 900 students." My eyes widen.

"That's extremely impressive."

"Thank you." She smiles and returns to her confident self. "What about you?"

"My school had the same grading scale. I graduated high school number 1 in my class out of roughly 600 students." It was her eyes that widened this time.

"Now THAT is really impressive." I shrug. We increasingly became more comfortable in front of the camera. It was like as the internet/camera began to get to know us, the more we got to know about each other.

"SAT Scores. I got a perfect score on math and missed a few points on the English portion. I think it was along the lines of 2330 out of 2400." I mention, moving on to our next subjects. My arm is still around her waist and I lean back on the couch to get more comfortable.

She giggles. "I got 2370 with perfect scores on the English portions."

"That's amazing."

"Eh. I worked really hard. I studied basically everyday of the summer before senior year." She looks down at our next topic and continues, "Next, did you do any extracurriculars?" She puts her hand on my knee, making it really hard to concentrate.

"I am in rowing, and the team I was on made it to championships. Harvard's rowing team' coach wanted me so here I am. Academics was only partially what got me in here, it was all due to rowing."

"I tutored other students at my school and played the piano in Seattle Symphony orchestra."She plays the piano? Could I be more amazed? Probably not.

"A big part of getting into college is standing out and being unique to the school, along with hard work and ethics."

"So this is a pretty short video but we just wanted to introduce ourselves. If you liked this video, please leave comment, like and subscribe!"

"Be sure to mention what you would like to see next from us!" And with that, we wave goodbye and turn off the camera.

"That was better than expected." I mention. "I think it's really great that we're getting to know each other. Like you play in the symphony? That's extraordinary" I go off on a tangent and start pacing the room as I speak.

She laughs, "Christian it's really nothing. We all have something we're good at. Mine is piano. Anyways I've got to get to class. I'm glad I'm doing this with you Christian; I couldn't imagine doing it with anyone else. I really think this could work. Are you sure you're okay with editing this first video?"

"Me too Ana, and don't worry I'll figure it out. Elle said she'll gives us the feedback a couple days after the video is uploaded."

"Alright sounds good." She stands up and grabs her bag. Walking towards me, I see is hesitant on what she's about to do next. The next thing I knew, she had her arms around my neck and her head on my chest, and it didn't hurt, only peace.

"See you later, Christian."

"Laters baby." I wink and she laughs on her way out, potentially taking my heart with her.

A/N So I sprained my wrist and am currently typing with one hand unfortunately. I appreciate every single one of you guys and I would like to know how you guys are enjoying One Chance, any video suggestions, etc in the review. So yeah thanks guys! Talk to you guys soon! Also, if you want to follow my tumblr (all about Jamie Dornan and fifty shades), it's j dash d dash o dash r dash n dash a dash n dot tumblr dot com.Please leave a review!


	4. Realizations

Christian's POV

I sat there staring at the screen for awhile. Well, mostly at _her._ I've been sitting there, supposed to be editing for the past two hours. I couldn't figure this shit out – and I couldn't focus on it with Anastasia on the screen.

I'm so enamored by her and her grace and I didn't know how to handle what I was feeling. Usually when I met a girl, it was a fuck and duck. I didn't want any strings attached because I simply didn't care for all of the emotions that came along with it. It was fucked up, but it was what I did best.

However, when I'm with her. I want everything and more. I'm convinced by now that she thought I was a creep. I barely met her and we haven't really gotten to know each other but she wasn't any girl I've ever met before. She was sweet and kind and didn't throw herself at me like every other girl here.

Two hours later, I finally figured out the video editing software Elle sent and sent the draft to both Anastasia and Elle to upload. After, I paced around the room for a bit. Watching Ana over and over for the past 5 hours made me antsy. I potentially wanted to pursue a relationship with her but if it were to go wrong, I wouldn't want this arrangement to end.

I needed to remain professional around her. Or try to at least.

* * *

5 Days later

Ana's POV

A few days have passed by since Elle uploaded the video and needless to say. It was doing a lot better than I expected. It reached a thousand views within two days. Christian said it was probably because it was college application season.

 _Sigh._ Christian.

He's been so good to me. He's been so kind and patient with me. My heart flutters just thinking about all of the small interactions we've had together.

I went over to his place yesterday to film another video, _How We Met._ We talked about how the professor recommended me to help Christian with the class, as he had trouble writing his final essay paper. Then how we realized we have a lot in common and came from Seattle. Thus, beginning our "relationship."

*Flashback*

" _I think that went really well," he said with his million dollar smile._

 _"I think so too. Elle said that our last video has been pretty good considering it's just the first one."_

 _"I'm pretty excited. She said we have a total of 15 subscribers so far," he said enthusiastically. His chuckle is contagious._

 _"We have a long way to go. But starting is better than not doing it at all," I giggle._

 _"That is true." He begins to put the camera equipment away and starts to clean up the pillows we used for sitting on the floor. I fold up the blanket that I had wrapped around myself. Despite the heater going in his apartment, the fall weather at Cambridge was freezing._

 _"Are you hungry? I make a mean peanut butter and jelly sandwich," he said wiggling his eyebrows, walking over to his kitchen cabinets._

 _"Yes please. I'm starving." I walk over to the island in the kitchen and sit on the stool accompanying it. I wrapped my arms around myself, shivering._

 _As he brings out all of the ingredients, he looks over to me and frowns. He then pulls off the Harvard hooded sweater he was wearing and walks around the island to me._

 _"You're cold." He stated, giving me the sweater._

 _I blush, but accept the sweater from him and put it on. His warmth envelopes me, and scent comforts me – all woody and manly._

 _"Is it that obvious?" I ask, mildly embarrassed._

 _He pulls out the blanket that I had just put away and wraps it around my shoulders. He kisses my cheek,"No worries. It's cold. I think the sweater looks better on you than it does on me anyways."_

 _Walking back to the other side of the island, he returns to making the sandwich like nothing ever happened._

*End of Flashback*

Sure our relationship had great potential. Deep down, I had feelings for him. Unfortunately, I had bigger things to worry about than just myself.

He was picking me up today to go out for lunch and we were gonna take some photos together to post on our social media.

That reminds me, I still need to tell my dad about Christian and I. After talking a bit more about our situation, we agreed to pretend to date and keep the pretend part between us and Elle. It would be difficult to keep up the pretenses and switch on and off our fake relationship with different people around.

I put on some leggings, an oversized sweater, and some boots, while also wearing light makeup. I was dressed up more than usual, because I wanted to look good about our mini photoshoot.

I walk out to the kitchen to get some water and see Jack standing at the fridge with the door open. I move around him to get to the water dispenser, but he suddenly backs up into me, almost making me lose my balance.

"Jack!" I yell.

"Ana," he takes a step back, looking at me up and down. His look gives me the chills, the hair stands up at the back of my neck.

"Why don't you look mighty fine," he says while giving me a disturbing smirk.

"I-" I start to respond but then there was a knock on the door, "That must be Christian. Bye Jack."

I hurry towards the door, forgoing the water. I open the door and relief spreads through my body, "Christian."

"Hey baby," he leans in for a hug I assume to keep up the pretenses, "You look beautiful."

"Thank you. We should go." We leave not before I look behind me to see Jack standing there with his hands crossed and a stern look on his face in the kitchen.

He nods, "after you." He holds the door open, leading me out with his arm around my waist.

We walk out to his car, and he pulls the passenger door open.

"Anastasia, are you okay?" I turn around so that I'm leaning against the car door and he's in front of me. "You seem upset."

"It's- It's no big deal." I shake my head. I didn't want to make a big deal out of nothing. Maybe I was just reading the situation wrong and Jack was just being nice. That has to be it. Right?

"Obviously something has happened to make you this upset," he pushes a fallen strand of hair behind my ear.

"I just don't want to talk about it right now."

He nods understandingly,"Just know that if you ever need anything. I'm here for you. We're friends now. You can talk to me."

 _Ouch_. _Did I just get friendzoned?_

"Thank you." He wraps his strong arms around me, and lean against him for comfort.

I guess he was just keeping up the image.

 _Well I guess there's no hope for me._

* * *

After we ate lunch, Christian said he was taking me to a secret location. He wouldn't budge after nagging him since he told me when we started eating.

We sit in a comfortable silence in the car as he drives, with Coldplay playing in the background.

 _Nobody said it was easy_

 _It's such a shame for us to part_

 _Nobody said it was easy_

 _No one ever said it would be this hard_

 _Oh take me back to the start_

He continues to drive up a windy road towards the mountains.

"You're not taking me here to murder me right?" I joke.

"Oh no! You've uncovered my plan," he feigns and starts laughing. "No, I have much better plans for us than committing a crime, Ms. Steele."

10 minutes later he pulls up near a cliff that was off the trail. It had frabicated an archway from the crowded, leafy trees so close together. However, the most gorgeous part of the scenery was that the archway focused on the sunset, overlooking the steep cliff. There was no one around. Just us two and a view.

He brings out a blanket from his trunk, laying it on the ground. He sits down and pats the spot next to him, signifying that I should take a seat beside him.

"The view is breathtaking. It's so peaceful here." I say.

"I'd like to say this is my getaway. I come here when I just need to escape my life for a little bit." I turn my head to look up at him. He stares at the sunset in front of us, his gorgeous grey eyes shining.

"It's a pretty far drive from Harvard," I comment.

"I think it's worth the drive. I sometimes just want to forget school," He turns his focus towards me now. "I must argue that the sunrise is much better than the sunset, but it's not as beautiful as you."

I blush, deciding to ignore his comment, "That's pretty early to drive all the way up here," I furrow my eyebrows.

"It's a force of habit. I wake up often in the middle of the night so it's not much of a difference." He turns away, indicating he was done discussing the topic at hand.

He then takes his phone out, "I thought this would be a good place to take some pictures of us. It's a good opportunity for uh- what do people call it? Golden hour?" He asks confusingly.

I giggle. "I think so. How should we pose? We can start with us sitting together like we are now."

I scoot closer to him, bringing my arm behind him to wrap around the crook between his neck and broad shoulders. He takes a few in a selfie mode with us in various poses of sitting together. We both smile at the camera.

I look at the screen of his phone and he turns to take a picture of him kissing my cheek. However, a notification pops up on his phone and it comes as quickly as it goes. He didn't get to read it because he was looking away but it didn't leave quickly enough for me to misread it.

 _Elena: I miss you baby. What day does your flight come in for Thanksgiving?_

My mood takes a one eighty and anger soars through me. Not only did he lie to me by omission, this _girl_ knew that we weren't actually together. We agreed to complete discretion. This girl had to know we were pretending right? Why else would she text him that?

Of course. He only sees you as a friend.

 _We're friends now. You can talk to me._

I had to be fine. We agreed to pretend. That's all this was. Pretend. I had to focus on why I was doing this in the first place. I couldn't get mad at him over nothing. It wasn't my business.

"I'd like to leave now." I stood up abruptly and walk towards his car.

He looks at me confused. I was just hurt because I let my emotions get the best of me and I lost focus of my priorities. I had to let it go.

* * *

A/N I am so sorry for the extremely long wait. My life has changed a lot the past year. I graduated high school, got into and now attending my dream college, and found out I had an autoimmune disease. It's winter break now so hopefully I'll be able to update more. Nevertheless I hope you guys enjoy and please review (: It'll be much appreciated.


	5. A New Start

I ignored him the whole car ride home. I partially felt bad because we drove almost an hour to get to that place and I made us leave after not even 10 minutes. He didn't even know what he did wrong.

He probably thought I was a bitch now. _Great._ And I'm now upset with myself.

I lean my head against his window and close my eyes for the ride home.

"Are you ok?" Christians asks, giving me a concerned look.

"I- uh. I'm sorry. I'm just not feeling well."

"Oh. That's okay. I'll take you home."

He holds my hand the entire way back. That brings me back to what I was concerned about before. _He's too good to me._

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Christian's POV

I planned out this time for us and Anastasia's mood took a one-eighty. I don't even know what happened. I kissed her cheek and all of a sudden she got upset.

 _Maybe she's uncomfortable with that kind of affection._

I should take a step back. The car ride home was silent. It was uncomfortable to say the least. She seemed angry.

Thirty minutes later, I pull up in her dorm building parking lot and park my car. I look over and she's sleeping peacefully, free from her worries. Her long lashes fan out against her cheek and her usually furrowed eyebrows are relaxed.

I brush her hair behind her ear and gently wake her.

"Anastasia. We're back." Her eyes flutter open. For some reason, she looks sorrowful rather than her earlier irritation while we were at my secret spot.

"I'm sorry," she hesitates, struggling to spit out her words, "I just didn't know you had a girlfriend."

 _WHAT_

"What are you talking about?"

Who is she to make assumptions about me? I would walk to the ends of the earth for this girl who I just met and she thinks I'm lying to her? Anger courses through my veins. I grip the steering wheel that is in front of me and stare blankly at the front of the dorm building.

"I accidentally saw the text from your girlfriend. I- I didn't mean to. Your notification popped up and it was from her." She looks down, sadly and her lips start to quiver. "It wasn't right of me to assume th-"

"Damn straight," I mutter quietly, but I know she hears me as she sucks in a breath. "You don't know anything about me so don't act like you do," I say harshly. I guess my defense mechanism was just to push everyone around me away. That's how I always remembered it.

"I apologize. I overreacted over nothing. It was wrong of me." She opens the car door and begins to walk into her dorm building.

I sit there, sulking for a minute until I realize that it was getting dark and that she had to still walk through a dark, long hallway to get to the front door of her building.

I understood where she was coming from. I was from the revelation of her speculation but she had good reason to. I pull out my phone and search through my recent texts while running around the building to find her. It was getting dark and I didn't want her to walk back alone. It was a 3 minute walk from the parking lot to her room, but anything could happen in 3 minutes.

I walked the route she usually took to her room and didn't see her along the way. Waiting outside her suite door, I looked closely at my text messages. Elena texted me.

"Fuck!" It all makes sense. Elena asked when I was coming home, what else was Ana supposed to think. "Arghh." I raise my fist to punch the wall beside the door, but the door suddenly swings open.

Paul stands there with his arms crossed.

"What did you do to Ana? She walked in here in tears."

"This is none of your fucking business. I need to talk to her." I make a step to enter the doorway but he blocks my way.

"Look. Take a breather. I care about Ana a lot. She's like a sister to me. I don't know what went down but she's really upset. You shouldn't make her even more upset with your emotions and behavior." He hesitates, but then steps to the side of the doorway to let me in. "Think about what you're gonna say first."

I nod, giving him a grateful grin. Taking a deep breath, I walk in the direction of Ana and Kate's room and I hear sniffling and some muffled words behind the door.

I knock on the door and wait. Few seconds later, Kate swings open the door.

"Fix this," she says sternly, giving me a death glare.

I slowly walk in and see Ana is face down on her bed. All of the anger that radiated in me vanishes. With all of her tears, she still has never looked so gorgeous to me. She just looks breathtaking all of the time.

"Kate, who is it?" She sniffles and turns her face to see me.

"Hey." I say. She rushes to sit up and wipes her the tears from her eyes and the hair that is matted to her face from her tears. "Hey, hey it's okay. It's just me." I sit down next to her and pull her into a hug, holding her head to my chest. Her beautiful, chestnut hair with her wonderful floral scent wafts under my nose, and I can't help but place a kiss on top of her head.

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't be crying right now. I just- I'm going through a lot right now a-and you're just so good to me. Why are you even here? You should be furious with me. What I said to you was so wrong." She sobs harder into my chest the more she speaks. "And now I've ruined your shirt. I feel like I messed up everything."

"It's not a big deal." I rub my hand up and down her back, trying to calm her down. "Shhh, it's okay. Deep breaths. Don't cry over me, baby."

She starts to calm down, hiccuping in between her breaths.

"Elena doesn't mean anything to me." I start, holding her tighter to me.

"We were together when I was in high school and that was three years ago. Every time there's a school break, she texts me and I've always made it clear that we were no longer together when I left for Harvard. However, she doesn't seem to get the message." I say sorrowfully.

She nods, "I was just so angry in the moment, because I thought I could trust you and then when she texted that. I thought you had told her about our plan, and I just felt so betrayed." She looks down regretfully.

I nod in understanding, pushing her to reveal her feelings. "I haven't told anyone about our arrangement. Only you and Elle know."

"I know I've said it so many times, and I want you to know that I really mean it. It's not something I throw around meaninglessly. I'm really sorry."

"I understand. Anastasia, in order for this to work I need you to trust me. We need to trust each other. We can go around wondering if the other has revealed our arrangement."

"I realize that. I just got so carried away, with you and my feelings for you and-" She gasps and covers her mouth with her hand in astonishment."I mean-"

"You have feelings for me?" My eyes widen and my heart beats 10 times faster.

"I-"

I cut her off in excitement, "Because I have feelings for you."

She giggles and gives me a wide smile, making my heart thump through my chest, and my emotion reflects hers. I stare into her ocean blue eyes, wiping the remaining wet tears from her face with the pad of my thumbs.

With my hand at the nape of her neck, I pull her closer, closing my eyes. Our lips meet in a chaste yet sensual, sweet kiss. I pull back, leaning my forehead against hers.

"Wow," she says.

"Wow indeed." I smile, pulling her in for a multitude of kisses.

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Wednesday morning came, two days after our admission and I've never been happier.

We have a morning meeting with Elle to catch up and be on the same page as to what our plan, going forward is. With our youtube channel of course.

I leave my apartment, going over to her dorm once again to pick her up. I walk down the now familiar side walk and enter her building. I had texted her that I was on my way over, and I see her already sitting in the lobby of the building.

She looks stunning. Wearing a sweater dress that ends a little bit above her knee, thigh high socks, and some boots, she makes me nervous. How could a girl like her end up with a guy like me?

"Hello, beautiful." I've always said it genuinely, but now I don't have to hide under the pretenses that it was for arrangement and we were in front of people. Now, it was just us.

"Hi handsome." She reaches up to give me a quick peck. However, that's not enough for me. I wrap my arms around her waist and pull her tight against me.

" _Kiss_ me." I say. She reaches up again, this time wrapping both of her arms around my neck, giving me a hard, passionate kiss, her lips warm and soft and her tongue sweet. I will not ever get enough of her.

"Let's get going."

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We sit in the two chairs across from Elle's desk as she goes through our documents and figures from the two videos. We sit in a comfortable silence as I sit there holding Anastasia's warm hand in mine.

"So how have you two been?" She asks.

"We have never been better," replies Anastasia. I nod in agreement.

"I'm looking at your views and subscribers rate right now, and it seems that with the rate you're going at, you'll reach 1000 subscribers by the end of the month. We just need to continue the set schedule we have right now."

"Will that be when our checks come in?" I ask.

"That is correct. However, the amount depends on how many views you guys have." She puts all of the paperwork on her desk back into a folder and puts it away. "Now, we can get this project moving faster and it's up to you guys. You guys are the young ones here and you guys know what the people would want. We need to have an outbreak video. One that blows everyone's mind."

"I think we can probably think of something. We can do some research as to what is usually trending and do a similar video to that." Ana responds.

"Great idea, Ana. I think another thing you guys can do is start sharing your videos on your social medias. The more views you have the better."

"That means our friends and family will see it?" I ask.

"Assuming you have your friends and family on social media, yes." Elle gives a warm smile.

Great, now I really have to tell my family about our relationship.

"We can do that," Ana replies for the both of us.

As of now, we are considered exclusive, but we haven't put a label on our relationship.

 _I know just how to rectify situation._

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A/N Thank you so much for the warm welcome back everybody! I was so motivated by all of your reviews! I hope you guys liked this chapter! Please tell me what you'd guys like to see or if you have any guess for what's gonna happen in the future chapters wink wink ;)


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